1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an RJ modular jack, and particularly, to an RJ modular jack configured by a wafer on which coupling traces are provided so as to create electrical coupling between selected terminals disposed within the wafer.
2. Description of Related Art
To comply with a high speed trend of data transmission, electrical devices are required to have better performance. Performance requirements have significantly increased to a level identified by industry standards as Category 5. The Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) in corporation with the Electronic Industries Association (EIA) has developed a proposed standard for Category 5 components. In such high speed applications, electrical coupling between adjacent terminals would create a great problem. Unless the electrical coupling between the terminals could be controlled effectively within the connector to an accepted level, it is highly unlikely that the connector can be used for long time.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,447,341 issued to Hyland on Sep. 10, 2002 discloses an RJ modular connector comprising a housing and a terminal insert received in the housing. The terminal insert includes a pair of wafers, a plurality of conductive traces formed on an inner surface of the wafer, and a plurality of terminals sandwiched between the pair of wafers. One conductive trace of the plurality of traces has a body portion aligned with one selected terminal and a connection portion fanning out from the body portion and disposed below a specific terminal for aligning with the specific terminal for electrically connecting with the specific terminal. Therefore, an electrical coupling between the selected terminal and the specific terminal is established. The connection portions of the conductive traces are distributed along an outer side of the body portions.
The electrical connection between the connection portion and the specific terminal is not reliable enough, by disposing the connection portion below the specific terminal. Therefore, the electrical coupling between the selected terminal and the specific terminal is simultaneously unreliable. Additionally, outwardly extending connection portions would occupy the extra space of the wafer and enlarge the length of the wafer.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,791,943 issued to Lo et al. on Aug. 11, 1998 discloses a modular outlet issued to Lo et al. comprises a housing supporting a plurality of contacts and a termination cap mated to the housing for terminating a plurality of wires at one end of the contacts. The contacts are positioned on a contact carrier received in the housing. The contacts include stacked current carrying plates to induce capacitance between the selected contacts. The method of achieving a controlled amount of capacitive coupling between selected contacts allows the modular outlet to meet or exceed Category 5 requirements. The insulation displacement contacts are sequentially positioned.
The contacts have connecting portions inserted into the housing for contact with the circuit traces. It is easy to distort the connecting portions of the contacts and thus it would result in unreliable electrical compensation between the contacts and the circuit traces.
Hence, an improved electrical connector is required to overcome the above-mentioned disadvantages of the related art.